Test Kitchen Tuesday

Sometimes it’s just plain hard to get all the nutrition you need in your day. Whether it’s because you’re travelling, your day is hectic, or you just don’t have access to lots of fruits and veggies, it happens.

Enter Amazing Grass.

Note: I have no affiliation with Amazing Grass whatsoever, and they have not asked me to write this post.

I first stumbled upon Amazing Grass a few years ago when it was promoted on an end cap at Whole Foods Market. I picked up a couple of individual serving packets of the Amazing Meal, and it was surprisingly good! However, I never really did much else with it.

Since we are remodeling a house in Seattle with no kitchen (for now), I have been thinking of creative ways to meet my daily nutritional needs and still feel reasonably healthy. I remembered that I liked the Amazing Grass products, and wandered over to Whole Foods to pick up some Amazing Meal packets as an insurance policy to make sure I get plenty of greens in my day. However, what I thought would be a quick purchase really wasn’t. Their product line is much bigger now, and the only solution I came up with was to buy a few individual packets from a variety of their options to see what I preferred.

Here is what I picked up:

• Amazing Meal Vanilla Chai Infusion
• Amazing Meal Pomegranate Mango Infusion
• Green Super Food  – Original
• Raw Reserve Super Food
• Lemon Lime Energy Powder

Over the past couple weeks, I have tried each of these items, so I thought I’d give you the breakdown of what I prefer. But, when I sat down to write this, I realized I like them all! So, instead of a “Review,” I thought I’d give you an overview of how I am using them.

Amazing Meal Vanilla Chai Infusion and Pomegranate Mango Infusion

I have been mixing these in a Blender Bottle in the following way:

• One serving of the Amazing Meal
• One scoop of Natural Vanilla Whey Protein
• One cup of almond milk

This makes a surprisingly thick and creamy “shake” without the need to dirty up your blender.  These powders are quite tasty and you don’t really notice that they are “greens powders” at all. The end result of the shake is really just like a vanilla smoothie that is good for you.

I have been eating this for breakfast, along with two fish oil capsules and 16 ounces of water. It powers me through to lunch no problem! I’ll write about the fish oil separately – it is a key component of my new nutrition stop-gap plan.

Original Green Super Food and Raw Reserve Super Food

While the Amazing Meal powders are quite tasty and go down easy unmasked, the Green Super Foods need some help, I think. I tried drinking the Raw Reserve in a bottle of water with nothing else, and it was not really a pleasant experience.

So, I have been adding these to my ultimate green smoothie, and I don’t even notice that they are there.

The nutritional panel to the right is for the Original powder, which I would recommend from a “taste” perspective over the Raw Reserve. The Raw Reserve is really quite strong tasting, in my opinion, over the original powder. I have been taking my ultimate green smoothie as a snack on days when I eat breakfast at the office or don’t have the Amazing Meal smoothie.

Green Superfood Lemon Lime Energy

I think this powder is intended to replace energy drinks, or even Gatorade. Of all the powders, it is the easiest to consume straight up in a glass or bottle of water, and that’s what I’ve been doing.

If I haven’t had any of the other powders for the day, I drop a serving into a bottle of water and just drink it straight. It has a pleasant lemon lime flavor, and is not very gritty at all, whereas the other powders are fairly gritty when just dissolved in water.

So, You Want a Greens Powder – Which Should You Choose?

If I have now thoroughly confused you about which powder you should choose, I would say this – do exactly what I did! Go to your health food store and pick up an individual packet or two of each item you think you would like to try. It’s a cheaper way to try out the powders without committing to a full tub of something you may not like! There are multiple flavors that I didn’t mention above (like chocolate Amazing Meal), so you may have different tastes than I do.

After a few weeks of using these greens supplements, I have noticed I have more energy, and just plain feel better. Interestingly, I have a slight flax allergy, and even though these powders have flax in them, they haven’t offset my symptoms yet, which is very exciting. 

It could be all mental, but I like the insurance policy the greens supplements provide, so I’m planning to keep it up!